have none."[54-A]

Christopher Smart, his brother-in-law, who was an adept in the art of
puffing, possibly wrote many of the advertisements of new books--notices
so cleverly phrased that they could not fail to attract the attention of
many a country shop-keeper. In this way thousands were sold to the
country districts; and book-dealers in the American commonwealths,
reading the English papers and alert to improve their trade, imported
them in considerable quantities.

After Newbery's death, his son, Francis, and Carnan, his stepson,
carried on the business until seventeen hundred and eighty-eight; from
that year until eighteen hundred and two Edward Newbery (a nephew of the
senior Newbery), who in seventeen hundred and sixty-seven had set up a
rival establishment, continued to publish new editions of the same
little works. Yet the credit of this experiment of printing juvenile
stories belongs entirely to the older publisher. Through them he made a
strong protest against the reading by children of the lax chap-book
literature, so excellently described by Mr. John Ashton in "Chap-Books
of the Eighteenth Century;" and although his stories occasionally
alluded to disagreeable subjects or situations, these were unfortunately
familiar to his small patrons.

The gay little covers of gilt or parti-colored paper in which this
English publisher dressed his books expressed an evident purpose to
afford pleasure, which was increased by the many illustrations that
adorned the pages and added interest to the contents.

To the modern child, these books give no pleasure; but to those who love
the history of children of the past, they are interesting for two